


Flight of Ashen Wings

by hecksalmonids



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Gen, Light Angst, basically just the engine room but featuring goroboy’s inner turmoil
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-01
Updated: 2020-04-01
Packaged: 2021-02-28 19:07:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 834
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23422150
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hecksalmonids/pseuds/hecksalmonids
Summary: Goro Akechi had never trusted claims of morality or kindness, not after years spent being used by his two-faced father as his personal hitman. What was going through his mind as he was defeated, spared, accepted by the Phantom Thieves of Hearts?
Comments: 1
Kudos: 15





	Flight of Ashen Wings

“You know what? I’ll let someone volunteer to take his place. Who knows, you might delay his death.”

The quiet, remorseless voice of the cognitive replica was clearly audible to Goro Akechi. His voice was a taunt, a kick to a downed opponent. Keeled over onto his knees, Goro knew he was truly and spectacularly defeated.

It wasn’t much of a surprise. The world had been quick to tear down anything he’d tried to hold on to, no matter how small — it was fate’s justice against him, he supposed, for daring to continue existing.

“You guys are all about doing things for others, aren’t you?” Another kick. Another reminder of how pathetic his position was. Goro wasn’t a fool, he knew none of the Phantom Thieves would throw away their lives for his.

_ The Phantom Thieves… _

Goro should have hated them. It should have been easy to hate them. For long before now, before his defeat, he had hated them. Now they had made a complete mockery of him, defeating him so utterly that he never had a single chance for victory. Soon, they would change his father’s heart and be hailed as the insufferable heroes they claimed to be. By all means, they should have sickened him.

Yet, they didn’t. He didn’t hate the ragtag masquerade party, and he knew exactly why. Their desire for justice, their passion for seeing that evildoers got as they deserved, it was truer than anyone else he had ever known. Years of meeting with his miserable false-faced father and his equally deplorable lackeys, witnessing his appallingly decadent Palace, had warped him into believing there were no good intentions behind anyone’s actions. Somehow, the group of misfits in front of him had shattered even that perception.

_ Damn them… _ They’d seen him at his worst. They’d learned that he murdered multiple people close to them. Heard him threaten to kill them one by one. Despite everything he had done, everything he was, they were willing to spare him. Allow him to fight by their side and show Masayoshi Shido the justice he should have seen years ago. Even acknowledged the strength he had just displayed.

_ “I don’t need... teammates… I don’t…” _

His last words during their battle rang in his ears. He made one last attempt to hold on to those words, to the hatred he felt against them. Scrounged for any semblance of anger against their sympathy. A futile effort, he realized — they’d broken him since the moment the battle ended. All he felt was gratitude, unfamiliar and sweet.

Almost inaudible, he let out a chuckle. _So, they managed to steal even my heart in the end._ _I’ve truly been outplayed._

At the end of it all, he was glad for his loss. If a group as admirable as the Phantom Thieves had managed to best him, perhaps there was a chance for the world they may save to be more than cruelty and loss.  _ I won’t let them die here. They need to see this game through to the end. _

“Oh, that’s just the same as me.” The words of the despicable cognition meant nothing to him anymore. He scanned the engine room, looking for anything to aid him, and his eyes landed on the switch for the bulkhead door. He steeled himself for what he needed to do. “I’m going to take all the blame for our captain. I’ll die for him t-“

_ BANG. _ As the gunshot reverberated through the enormous room, Goro watched as the replica’s head flew backward, the lifeless body falling limp to the floor.

Behind him, Akira’s arm dropped, still holding his gun. “You  _ will _ die for him, you puppet.”

Goro was far too stunned to notice that the four shadows that were once commanded by the replica readying to attack the party. Too late, he cried out. “Joker, they’re-“

“Riot Gun.”

As the black and white mask burned away from the boy’s face, pillars of gold lightning pierced upward from the ground like spears. They cut through the shadows like butter, and within seconds the once-formidable monsters had dissolved into black mist.

The skull-masked Ryuji was the first to find his words after the show of incredible power. “Dude… what the eff was that?”

Akira did little more than shrug, a seemingly neutral expression on his face. “I was getting sick of hearing him drone on. You ready to go, Crow?”

Only then did the reality of the whole scenario click. In just half a minute, every enemy in the room had been slaughtered, singlehandedly, by the red-gloved boy. Goro’s power truly was no match for the legendary leader of the Phantom Thieves. 

All he could do was laugh. He continued laughing for several minutes, as Akira watched him with a smirk and his teammates stared at him confusedly.

“Are you done?” Akira couldn’t keep the amusement out of his voice as Goro’s laughter subsided and he got to his feet.

“Let’s give that bastard father of mine what he deserves

**Author's Note:**

> Happy April Fool’s! :P  
> I’ve wanted to write a fic like this where Akira just shoots CogAkechi in the head for a while, and then I realized it works perfectly for April Fool’s, so I just went for it  
> Up next on my itinerary is a pegoryu fic that’s just pure fluff from Akira’s POV, stay tuned for that!  
> Also, no beta. We die like CogAkechi.


End file.
